Friday, March 02, 2012

sisterly love

This little post is about sisters. And love. And also a bit of knitting. All sort of interrelated and tied together.

I have this yarny sort of theory, that sport weight yarn is the new black. I really think that in the yarn world it's pretty much the cool kid at the moment. Yep, everyone wants to be friends with the good old sport weight yarn. I don't think it was any coincidence that I kept seeing new sport weight yarns popping up all over the place. In places like my Loyal Yarn Store. And in colours that were irresistible. Pure and Simple. Colours like this.

oh, and the most glorious glorious perfect yellow you have ever seen.

When I saw this yarn, I had to have some of it. It is so buttery soft. Some of that sport weight delight was going home with me no matter what. Who cares that I had no plan for it. Who cares that it was just going to sit in the stash with absolutely no purpose, it had to be mine. And it did sit.

Somehow I'm not quite sure but after designing Jane, another related design popped into my head. My sketch had lace and cables and some lovely drape happening. And while I do so love dk weight yarn more than any other, I just knew to do such lovely lace justice, to get the drape I really wanted for the design, this time dk just wasn't going to cut it. It had to be something lighter. Something like a sportweight yarn.

I so love it when a garment you're designing actually turns out better than you envisage. When internally you just want to do a little jump or cheer.

There's something about the mix of stocking stitch and lace that I really like. And I have to say, after knitting this I'm quite loving the idea of using cables running into lace.

The construction of this was so much fun. And believe it or not it's much easier to knit than it looks. The lace is really quite easy to follow and remember, and the cables are super-dooper simple. Picking up stitches is probably the most challenging aspect of this garment, and the pattern sets these out fairly precisely to make it easier to perform.

I so loved knitting with this 5ply yarn so much. It's the MillaMia Naturally Soft Merino, and is buttery soft.

This has been one very loved cardie. Over the Spring and the Summer Lily has worn this more than any other item in her woolly wardrobe. It's her definite favourite, and I think it might be one of mine too. I'm going to knit myself one too, for sure. I've already selected some lovely madtosh sportweight for mine.

The sisterly part? Well, when I named the Jane pattern, it got that name because it was quite simple and plain to look at despite its unusual construction. A plain Jane so to speak. It's also my second name. So when I decided to knit a sister garment for Jane, I looked to my sisters' second names. Luckily, I had four to choose from. Elizabeth seemed to suit this pattern best.

I do have plans for some more sister patterns, I'm thinking about the Autumn one right now but you know, it's probably not going to get released until after Autumn now as while I'm thinking, not much knitting is happening.

You can find more photos and the details for purchasing the pattern, as well as all my other patterns, in my Ravelry store.

4 comments:

Usually when we try to put too many ideas into one thing, the end result seems a bit...off...but with your usual genius-mind, cables-lending-to-lace, the details on the flared sleeves...it's enough to make me want to hurry up and try for a daughter ;) (OK...too much info...)Lucky I have a gorgeous niece!Many thanks for another lovely design! Cheers, Jenny (Tatterz)